Do You Want To Be An Icicle?
by OnkelJo
Summary: My name is Jonny Gerthson. I work as an R&D engineer. Or rather, worked, I should probably say; I haven't logged any hours since that crazy woman with the ashen hair appeared out of nowhere. Now I too am on the run from the Wild Hunt, whoever that may be. Really great idea to hide in Skyrim then, right? Self Insert (SI).
1. I Love LARPing!

**Hello, dear reader! Welcome to my story. I'll explain a couple of things under the chapter, but until then fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy ride. Curtain up!  
**

* * *

 **Chapter 1: I Love LARPing!**

"Well, if you absolutely want to crunch the numbers yourself, you are more than welcome to do so, but unless you have forgotten how to calculate, you will come to the same conclusion. My new software may not be your favorite but it will cut our costs in half. In half, Garry! Our clients will love you for it," I finished with an easy smirk. With the way his lips parted slightly to let his tongue smack against them, I knew I had him hooked. Appealing to his vanity was the one thing I knew would always work with my business partner.

I sighed inwardly. Garry had not always been like that. When we started our software company together, he had been just as idealistic as I still was. I let him handle most of the financial parts and I became more or less the head of R&D. Not that he wasn't a brilliant programmer, but after a while, our roles became more and more pronounced. We made millions with our VR swordfighting sim.

It was still less than a dollar net revenue per line of code (for now), but the praise for it in magazines all around the world went a little to his head.

I was still more than happy to oblige when he proposed to make the change in management permanent; I was never a businessman, and I was getting more leeway in terms of projects I wanted to pursue.

In this particular case, I had landed a deal (completely on my own for a change) for a group of LARP entrepreneurs who wanted a special version of our program for virtual competitions that involved a very generous pricing policy. What can I say, I loved LARPing; these prices weren't thought for just anyone. Needless to say, Garry wasn't too happy about it. Now, even less so, despite the fact that I made the company a lot of money today.

"I guess you're right," he sighed and closed the folder in front of him, "but I want all the technical details by Monday and a similar solution for our other products by the end of next week, are we clear?"

I nodded with a wide grin. "Crystal clear, Garry." I shook his hand and left the meeting room. Getting him to agree with my plans called for a celebration, so instead of making my way to my office, I took the scenic route and stopped by my personal simulation room. I texted him, asking if he wanted to join me, to blow off some steam. It didn't take long for him to reply and decline. I shrugged; his loss. This would be a lot of fun, with or without him.

Grabbing a wooden staff and a mask of the rack, I booted up the sim and readied myself for the ninjas that would attack me in a matter of seconds. In the blink of an eye, the barren walls made way for a forest, mist hanging low in the few rays of the morning sun that made their way through the thick foliage.

The whirring of fast moving wood was the only warning I got. I rolled to the side,and where I had stood just a moment ago, a bamboo staff impacted the ground. With a quick glance around I counted four hooded figures starting to circle me.

Not the easiest way to celebrate a successful day at the office, but it sure gets your blood pumping, and besides, this was part of the successful deal, so it was most fitting to celebrate here.

Were I to make the first move, I would pay dearly; having learned from painful experience, I gave up my usual aggressive stance for a way more defensive one. This wasn't my first time in this particular sim, and I didn't need celebratory bruises. I didn't swing that way.

No matter where I was going, they were now fully circling me. The first one tried to strike at me from behind, at my seemingly weaker left side. What they didn't know, because they didn't adapt to previous matches like the higher levels of our AI, was that I had offered this opening to them. Best thing about being ambidextrous, with a dominant left hand.

Grabbing the staff with both hands, I twirled around and struck down at the ninja, deflecting his blow and hitting the hand that wielded the staff in the process. The weapon clattered to the ground, but I had no time to revel in that. I pulled the swing through and came back around, just in time to catch the next wooden stick headed for me and barely deflect that one, too. I barrelled into him with my shoulder first, knocking the wind out of him and ramming him into the ground, with the pleasing side effect that I put distance between me and the other blunt objects heading my way.

Looming over him, I drove my elbow into his face, and the resounding crunch I was rewarded with meant one was already down and one (temporarily) disarmed after less than ten seconds. Probably a new record.

I didn't hear anything, but I knew they wouldn't give me time to finish him like you might be used to in video games. In real life, they had no qualms striking you down while you beat one of their own into a pulp.

I rolled away and avoided another bamboo staff that would have gave me some serious back pain if it had connected. Instead, it caught the downed assailant in the groin. Ouch. Thank the Maker it's only a simulation. I raised the staff to retaliate, but I didn't get to that.

That instant, I was flung away. That… was definitely not part of the simulation I had planned. Cursing, I motioned the simulation to stop. If there was a fatal flaw in my new design, I had to find it, as quickly as possible. Such a mistake could mean my end as a reputable programmer.

Imagine my surprise when instead of the barren room I expected, I found a young woman, with ash blonde hair and clad in very well made medieval clothes. She had a wild look on her face and a rather large sword in hand at the ready, although I didn't think she was keen on hurting me.

"Stay back, you madman! Another step and you'll get a taste of my blade!" she shouted, from what I could tell about as confused as I was and threatening me more instinctually than anything else.

"Woah there, lady. Calm down," I told her and raised my hands in surrender, letting my staff hit the ground. Who was that girl? "People usually call me genius, but... If you want to call me madman, go ahead... Is that a real sword?" Arms still raised, only a finger motioned to the pointy metallic stick.

"Where I come from, people fighting with imaginary enemies are either madmen gone down the deep end, or witchers in training, and you lack the cat eyes to be the latter," the woman scoffed. "And yes _,_ this _is_ a real sword," she added with a warning smirk.

"Not that I'm keen on pissing you off," what with the sword and all, "but I really have to ask: how the heck did you get in here? This is a secured area, not even most employees are supposed to get past the guards."

The woman let out a breathy laugh. "Don't take it out on your guards, I don't think I have exactly taken the front entrance. Where am I?"

I stared at her for a few long moments, not knowing whether to break into tears or start laughing maniacally. "Well that's just great," I sighed and rubbed my face. "You get past the most advanced security system in the state and you pretend that you don't even know where you broke in. Schwalben Programming Inc.; ring any bells?"

The blank stare I got in return was answer enough. "Okay, different question. _Why_ did you get here?"

"I'm on the run." she said, and stared me down with a defiant look on her face.

"Look, if you don't take anything and, more importantly, don't hurt me, we can all forget about this. You were never here. Sound good?"

"I'm not here to rob you," the woman said and rolled her eyes before taking a good look around. "What can you tell me about this world though? It looks like nothing I've ever seen."

What? "Do you mean in some weird metaphysical way?" I asked; then I saw the look on her face. "Right. Why am I even surprised. Fine, we'll play it your way and I assume you're from some fantasy world I don't know about. Heavy role playing for cosplay, but whatever... Well, for starters, you're on the planet Earth. It is, aside from animals, solely inhabited by humans. We don't have magic, but we're technologically advanced. We've harnessed Nature's powers like lightning or oil to run our machines. There are carriages without horses many times faster and stronger than one with them. Any questions?"

Of course, fate chose that moment to screw me over. The woman looked over my shoulder and froze. When I turned my head, all I saw was my whole simulation rig covered in snow.

The young woman paled even further. "We have to go. Now!"

"The fuck is going on?" I was profoundly dumbfounded. How snow of all things got in here, I had no idea. In May, no less!

She set her jaw and straightened up before staring me in the eyes. "The people who are after me usually take way longer to catch up to me. But wherever they go, snow and ice precedes them. The way I see it you have two choices here. Either you stay here, get caught by the Wild Hunt and end up an icicle after they are done with you, or you come with me and maybe you'll live to see another day."

Her calm tone was far more unnerving than what she was describing. Okay, not really. _I think I just peed my pants._

"Lead the way, scary lady. But if I die, I will kill you."

She gave me a dark smile that if anything furthered the dark spot in my pants. "You would neither be the first nor the last to try it."

With that, she hugged me suddenly, which was unexpected, but nice. Then a green light engulfed us both and everything went black. Just as unexpected, but not nice at all.

 _We are so gonna die!_

Despite the certainty of our deaths, we still had time left among the living, apparently, because when I opened my eyes, I was still very much alive. Although, to be honest, to find ourselves in a place that looked remarkably like not-yet-ruined Helgen got me thinking.

"Phew, that was a close call," she breathed, visibly relieved.

"Uhm… you might want to hold onto saying that, because that black piece of shit flying high in the sky is a motherfucking dragon!"

I always hate to repeat myself, but…

 _We are so gonna die!_

* * *

 **This story is set in what I like to call the "Jonny Gerthson Multiverse". That basically just means it's the collection of all my self insert stories featuring different alterations of my Alter Ego Jonny Gerthson.**

 **They don't know of each other, they don't know they're in a multiverse, they don't crossover with each other, they are not transported to their new homes in the same way or by the same entity. BUT it's the same guy, who starts out with pretty much the same personality, although his circumstances may differ from universe to universe.**

 **At the time of publishing, this multiverse comprises Castle (including Chuck and Eureka in the sequel), Dragon Age, Skyrim/Witcher (this very story), and a bunch of unpublished stories that may very well follow soon... ish. Those are all over the place (Fallout, Mass Effect, DCU, and so on) and get worked on sporadically, when I'm stuck with the published ones. Even this one falls under that I'd say, but I would like to get at least the first chapter out, to get my feet wet, so to speak. Let's see where this goes :)  
**


	2. BFD

**Chapter 2: BFD**

The young woman raised a hand to shield her eyes from the sun, and furrowed her brows when she too seemed to recognize the sleek form as a dragon. "A dragon, huh?"

Oh, no. I knew what such a determined look meant, and I didn't like it. "Nuh-uh, young lady. I'm going to stop you right there. This is not just any dragon, this is Alduin the Worldeater, firstborn of Akatosh, who happens to be the leader of the tamrielic pantheon. His son is a spoiled brat, but for now pretty much untouchable. You fight him, you die."

Her head whipped around and stared at me instead. "How could you possibly know that?" _Oh. So that's why I am suddenly more interesting than the dragon._

"It's… complicated," was all I brought out while thinking feverishly how to explain the concept of video games to her.

She gave me a dark smirk. "You know, it's not a good idea to lie to a Witcher. One, your pupils dilate, two, your breath quickens, three, you start to sweat, four, I can hear your heartbeat getting louder. You better rescind your explanation, fast."

"Fine," I growled, "have it your way. Our civilization made machines to solve simple calculations, because it's trivial and time better spent elsewhere. Those machines advanced and got more complex to the point where they could be used to calculate the behavior of whole worlds, in a simplified way of course. This allowed people to predict how a certain world would interact with people. Calculations of certain worlds, such as the world of Tamriel, were of purely recreational use, others that depicted our world were used for the military as well. Happy now?"

The young woman just stared at me before shaking her head. "What you're saying is preposterous, but your body tells me it is the truth… although, to be honest, I've seen weirder things. You are a strange little man."

With that, she briskly walked off in the direction of Helgen. It took me a moment to realize that she effectively ended our conversation. "Hey, wait for me! And I'm not little!"

She was about the same height as I was, but she had longer legs, so I needed to jog to catch up with her. "Are you crazy? You'll get yourself killed if you walk into that village while Alduin burns it down."

"I'm not going to fight the dragon," she said and rolled her eyes, "but he won't keep burning it forever, and if we are to stay in this world for a while, I need to know what the dragons here are capable of."

I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "Well, at least it's not as suicidal as what I thought you'd do. Although, for future reference, Alduin already is the most powerful dragon alive, so whatever you find would have to be scaled down for other dragons."

"While we're at it…" I said and stretched out my arms placatingly, "I don't think I'd be much good in a fight with neither weapon nor armor, but I'll go wherever you go. I don't know you, but from what I've gathered, I think that at some point, you'll have to kick some Wild Hunt butt, and the moment it's over, I need to get back. Are we clear?"

"Chrystal," she replied with a smirk and took off again, with a cursing Me in tow.

It didn't take us long to get to Helgen, although watching out for dragons added time to the trip.

The smell attacking our nostrils nearly turned my stomach upside-down. "I will never look at barbecue with the same eyes ever again; I think I'm going to be sick." What little tried to escape was quickly swallowed again, against all instincts.

"I've smelled worse," she muttered, although her skin seemed to be one or two shades paler.

The image that awaited us inside the village walls made me appreciate the missing realism from the game. The largest scorch marks I had ever seen stretched over half the village (where his fiery projectile vomit had hit probably) while charred corpses of houses and people alike were strewn about the place.

Although to be honest, it didn't look as bad as in the game. The houses were charred, sure, but none of the actual stone buildings were crumpled. "Well, looks like the path to the dungeons is blocked off. Helgen is not that big, if we go around that, we essentially do a whole sweep of the village."

She gave me a terse nod and stopped to listen for a moment, before holding up her hand. "There are survivors here."

I frowned. "What? There aren't supposed to be any. Alduin isn't known to leave survivors; he feeds off their souls, so… yeah…"

She gave me a startled look before it turned to an annoyed one. "Trust me when I tell you, there are people alive here. I can hear them."

"I don't hear anything," I said with a raised eyebrow.

"Of course you can't," she sighed, as if explaining it to a small child. Which, for all intents and purposes, she might as well have. "For the most part, only witchers, and people trained by witchers, can."

That did kind of make sense; or it would, if I knew what witchers were. "You said that word quite often, but who or what _are_ witchers, exactly?"

She pulled her sword before she answered, which made me a little nervous. "Men who undergo rigorous training, conditioning, and possibly deadly rituals in order to become a dangerous monsterslayer," she muttered absently, her eyes narrowing at the next corner and her body tensing.

I nodded solemnly. "So basically a Grey Warden, gotcha. Also… are you expecting trouble?"

"I always do," she shot back with a smirk. "And I have no idea what a Grey Warden is, but sure, let's go with that. Oh and by the way, the people behind that corner are armed."

I had no idea how she could possibly know that, but I didn't know better, so I went along. We stalked along the wall and rounded the corner, although in hindsight, I probably should not have wanted to. A score of stormcloaks were busy tearing down buildings, which would make them closer to what I expected to find.

One particular fellow was in charge, apparently, as he shouted at his "Remember your king's words, men! The actions of this dragon are to be made even scarier! When the Thalmor come to investigate, they need to soil their dirty elven panties!"

"Eep!" I really, really should have stopped my surprised yelp. Twenty pairs of eyes (twenty one, if you count my companion giving me an incredulous look) fell on the pair of us and everyone stopped in their tracks.

The rebel lieutenant recovered his wits first. "Intruders! Kill them both, dead men tell no tales!"

His men were well trained, they stepped into motion immediately. As did my interdimensional chauffeur, incidentally. I tried to pull her into a retreat, but my hand grabbed empty air as she was already charging into her imminent death. The first stormcloak didn't fare better than I and hit the ground with her overhead swing, her greatsword stirring up dust. She had time to look up in wonder at her missed target, only to lose her head over the miss, quite literally.

By that point, for lack of better ideas, I ran in as well with my bare hands.

My ashen-haired companion was a blur. She weaved through the enemies, blinking in and out of existence randomly, which was extremely cool, and cut down half a dozen bluecoats before I even joined the fray. Everyone concentrated on her and saw her as the real threat. They were right, of course, but that didn't stop my pride from flaring up a little.

Thinking better of bringing fisticuffs to a swordfight, I picked up the unlucky first stormcloak's greatsword from the ground, positively surprised that I had wielded even heavier sticks during apple harvest, and stormed at the nearest stormcloak soldier with a crazed battle cry, not caring the least bit that this bear of a man was easily two heads taller than me.

As I expected, they weren't bad, but they had nothing on the ninjas I had faced back in my simulation, at least in terms of speed. I stepped out of the way of a warhammer heading for my midsection with relative ease and sliced up the guy's chest in return, albeit only giving him a shallow cut, barely half an inch deep maybe, since I overestimated the reach of the newly-acquired sword and underestimated the thickness of the fur-padded Stormcloak armor.

With the help of the momentum from the swing, however, I spun around for a second helping, catching him between his neck and his shoulder. It was a close call for him, having missed the carotid artery by maybe a hand, if I remembered my biology classes correctly.

He cried out in pain, which only grew in intensity when I pulled out the offending blade. The man dropped his warhammer, his right arm hanging limply at his side; I noted with strange satisfaction that I had to have severed some muscles with my swing. Nonetheless, he suddenly started smiling through gritted teeth.

That should have already alarmed me, but it soon became clear what he wanted to do when he went for my throat with his good hand. Most people would need two hands to strangulate someone.

Not this guy.

I suppose it was the Nord's hardy constitution that had him lift me up by the neck with one big paw. As I wasn't into asphyxiation, the spotty vision with darkness creeping in from the edges was a very unpleasant experience. Not to mention the distinct lack of air.

I vaguely heard my new sword scatter across the ground with a dull metallic thud. Here I was not five minutes into something my brain had yet to decide between dream and nightmare for, and I was already brushing too close for comfort with death. Which also meant that my brain was screaming " _Oh god, oh god, we're all going to die!"_ at me on repeat while I was being strangled. So I resorted to harebrained ideas.

Whatever drove me to snake my legs around my potential killer's neck and squeeze hard, I had no idea, but I would like to buy it a drink. Apparently he wasn't into asphyxiation either, as he dropped his grip on my neck to pull me off him.

I'm sure it was his instinctive reaction, because had we remained as we were, I would have passed out long before him.

Instead, I pulled close enough that his face was right at my groin, which was dangerous for my man parts if he had bitten, but it had the side effect that I could now squeeze with my thighs.

You have never seen my thighs, but let me tell you, it took me maybe ten seconds to split his skull. That little explosion in the middle of the fight made everyone stop in their tracks and stare at me for a second. Blood and brain flying everywhere, splattering all the soldiers around us in a three foot radius.

"Huh," I coughed out between deep breaths, trying to get all the bloody Nord brain off my shirt and jeans (a lost cause), "haven't done that to anything other than a watermelon."

The ashen-haired woman made use of my overkill of a diversion to dispatch of the rest of the Stormcloak soldiers. Which put her at nineteen, and me at one. On one hand, that's a pretty bad balance, on the other hand, _I had just killed a guy._

She strode over and waited respectfully a few steps away while I emptied my stomach by the leftovers from the fight.

"So… first kill?" she asked, surprisingly gently.

"What gave it away?" I snapped and wiped my mouth. "But yes, first kill. Unless you count flies and mosquitos. I learned how to fight pretty well, but not how to kill. That," I said and pointed at my victim, "was purely panic from the strangulation."

"If it makes you feel better, I've seen many fights and even more kills, but yours was very… unique," she offered.

I snorted. "You have never really consoled anyone, have you?" I asked drily.

She started chuckling, and after a moment of resisting the urge, I joined in. We must've been a weird image, two armed persons chuckling among their fallen enemies.

But, I survived my first fight in Skyrim. Go me.

* * *

 **For now, I have found a more or less doable schedule! I try to keep the updates to my stories a nice daisy chain- although my Dragon Age Story might lag a bit, since it's the only story I have a beta reader for.  
**

 **Also, I don't often use this much graphic detail. This chapter was an exception, although the M rating is not just for smut, you know ;)**


	3. Rescue Team

**I'm still alive! :D Still in the thick of it with exams and all, but I got this little bugger done. I think I know now where to take this story. Blame 'Critical Role' ;)**

* * *

 **Chapter 3: Rescue Team  
**

It shouldn't have come as a surprise that our first encounter in Skyrim was a 'Kill first, ask questions later' situation.

My puke fest was no surprise either. The Stormcloak corpses who were unfortunate enough to have gotten their chest cavity forcefully opened were a steaming mess- quite literally. The air certainly was cold enough.

We stood a stone's throw away so I could calm my stomach. After a moment of washing the puke out with some spit, I swiped off my mouth and stood up again, smiling with as much dignity as I could muster. "Well, first things first, since we have shed blood together, I suppose we've earned to at least know each other's names. I'm Jonathan."

Sudden laughter bubbled up in her throat. "You are the weirdest person I know."

"I'll file that under compliments," I huffed, still trying to get the taste of puke out of my mouth.

"If you must," she retorted with a smirk. "You can call me Ciri, by the way."

Ciri… I could have made a bad iPhone joke, but for once, I did not want to muck this up from the start. Not that she would get the joke, probably.

On the other hand, it's likely she hadn't heard it before. If anyone she ever met knew what an iPhone was, they probably knew better than to make fun of her name.

"So… what now?" she asked, tearing me out of my thoughts.

"I have no idea," I laughed mirthlessly. "Figures. I'm not even an hour in Skyrim and I'm already questioning my knowledge. This place was supposed to be empty after the attack, and some time later be inhabited by bandits, not used as a Stormcloak ploy to fool the Thalmor."

Ciri raised an eyebrow. "My question remains; but what's the next town from here?"

I thought for a moment. "From Helgen? Probably either Falkreath or Whiterun. The next settlement would probably be Riverwood, that village is closer to Whiterun though. Why do you ask?"

"The Wild Hunt, as the evil powers who are after me call themselves, were hot on my heels before I came to your world, and they probably followed me there as well," she divulged with a sigh. "For lack of better words, they can sense my location when I use my powers. I fled to you in front of their very noses, and I defended myself the instant I showed up, which meant they knew where I was in a few moments. Here, I used them almost as fast, but longer. It's been ten minutes instead of the few moments in your world, and they haven't shown up yet."

She waited a moment for a spark of understanding in my eyes, but that didn't come - it was interesting information, but I had no idea where she was going with this.

At least she didn't roll her eyes, although I could imagine she just swallowed that reaction. "I don't know what is keeping them, but if we are to stay here- for a while, at least- we need supplies."

 _Click._ "Ooh... 'now I see it too', said the blind man. If we want supplies, then we should check out the cave beneath the village. If there were any survivors, they would probably go through there. Perhaps we find some leftovers, or maybe even survivors. From what I know, maybe a few human-sized poisonous spiders as well."

Ciri wasted no time. She waited just long enough for me to pick up another weapon; having not fared that well with the greatsword, I rummaged through the remains for something maybe a little easier to handle. In the end, I got myself a hide shield and an iron axe, since I wasn't too keen on getting a faceful of frostbite venom and perhaps I'd have an easier time getting through their chitin shells.

It took us a few minutes but we found the entrance outside Helgen without much issue. As expected, since there weren't any other caves in the vicinity.

It was a relatively steep descent, but we both got down in one piece, although I slipped once and nearly fell if it hadn't been for the swift grasp of my companion. At least it would probably be easier on the way out.

The only light sources I could make out were a few untrustworthy cracks in the ceiling and the occasional brazier. While that had me stumbling through the cave almost blindly everywhere the light from the surface and the fire didn't get to, it also meant that someone had to have come through here pretty recently. With any luck, this meant there was a Dragonborn. I didn't even dare to hope that they weren't a homicidal psychopath.

For now, survival would be great.

"I smell a bear," Ciri said and stopped me with her hand. "Still alive, so no sudden exclamations this time, understood?" I nodded silently; at least there was no venom in her voice, not even weariness, so I had that going for me.

We both got low and gingerly inched around what we suspected was the lair of the bear. I had no idea what I was doing, of course, but copying what Ciri did worked well enough, I thought.

Ciri held her hand up. "Three heartbeats ahead. Stationary, but probably hurt." That stopped me in my tracks. _Three? That's… unusual._ I shook my head to get out of the stupor I was in, which luckily meant that I got into motion before my ashen-haired companion had time to turn around.

The cave chose this time to start shaking. "Shit, I don't think we have much time before the ceiling comes down on us," I semi-whispered, believing us far enough away from the bear as well.

She tersely nodded. "True. We won't get anyone out if we don't take care of the bear. I'll try and get all three out, you get rid of the bear."

"Got it." Then I went over what she said in my head. _Wait, what?_ "Wait, what? You want me to fight the bear?"

Now I got an exasperated look from her. "Unless you have knowledge how to treat multiple wounded at once, you better put that axe to good use."

I gulped loudly. "Still, it was nice knowing you."

Perhaps my mind was playing tricks on me, but I could have sworn she had a smirk on her lips when I turned around, axe and shield in hand.

I traced back our steps to where we saw the bear earlier. To my horror, the place where the bear had been sleeping was empty.

A moving shadow and a low growl to my right was all the warning I got. Rationally, I wouldn't have expected my shield to do much good against a giant bear, but that didn't keep me from pulling it up.

In the end, I thanked the gods for being left handed. Which meant my shield was on my right arm; this way, I only lost feeling in my arm for a while, not the arm itself. The heavy paws scraped over the hide, and rattled my bones to the point where I felt the arm going numb.

It wasn't like it was hanging limply at my side, I just didn't feel anything. Might've been a blessing in disguise, really. If I hadn't suspected it before, this would've taught me that an enraged brown bear mama packs one hell of a punch.

I swung wildly and got her in the snout, which she didn't like one bit. She roared at me in pain, loud enough to send pebbles flying from the ceiling. Maybe she smelled my fear, because she got up on her hind legs and showed me all ten foot of her massive bear body.

I've driven with one hundred and fifty miles per hour and was close to screaming, so you can imagine how I felt when pure fear gripped me.

I backed away with the shield raised between me and the beast. She came back down and landed with a thump. Snarling, she quickly closed the distance. I knew I'd be paste if half a ton of angry bear would hit me.

To my surprise and relief, I didn't have to find out. The cave was crashing down as it was, and the bear's roar's volume didn't help. Well, technically it did help, because she got her skull caved in by a melon sized rock that fell from the ceiling. Looked more like a half empty basketball than an actual skull, really.

"If you could hurry up, that'd be great!" I shouted, my eyes wandering down the unstable ceiling.

"Shut up and help me, you oaf!" came the prompt response from further down the cave.

I wasted no time and ran towards them. When I reached Ciri, I saw three men with her, all Nords from what I could tell in the stressful twilight of this cave, and all limping as fast as they could. _Damn, those heightened senses of hers sure come in handy,_ I thought. _She was spot on with her intel._

The three of them all looked deathly pale, and the one with darker hair seemed to have a sheen of sweat pool around his brows. "Is the bear taken care of?" she asked.

"Yup. I got lucky though; she would probably have had me if a rock hadn't caved her face in. But hey, she won't bother us on the way out."

"Indeed," Ciri sighed. "Come on, we need to get out of here before we get buried alive," she commanded us. It was a torturously slow walk back to the surface, and not a minute too soon. As soon as we were out we heard the thundering crack of the cave finally giving in under the aftershocks of the dragon attack.

Being out of immediate danger, we chose to take a few minutes to calm down and get a little breather. A few larger rocks were our seats; now I got a better look at the people we rescued.

All three were men, and Nords, apparently, although I had guessed as much already. Two of them wore familiar faces, Ralof and Hadvar, but the third one I had no idea about. He had even fairer hair than Ralof, and a hard edge to his face.

Hadvar was green in the face, and didn't stop sweating. "Is everything alright?" I asked him.

"It will be," Ciri said from her stone. "If he has survived this long, the potion won't kill him."

We all stared at the ashen haired madwoman. "Are you saying that you poisoned us?" the stranger asked with the tiniest hint of stinkeye.

She quirked her lips and stared right back at the man. "If I wanted you dead, I could have left you buried under stone and nobody would have known," she snorted. "I gave you a watered-down potion that usually kills most people; for people who can handle it, though, it's a very effective remedy for most ailments. Broken bones, flesh wounds, acid burns, this will take care of it. Mostly. It may scar."

This shut them up good. Not that they were in any position to argue; they looked like shit, honestly. Anything that they might've tried, even I could have fended it off. After another ten minutes, Hadvar seemed to be over the hill, as his eyes started focussing again and it looked like he noticed his surroundings again. He was still sweating profusely, but even that seemed to slow.

That's when we heard a low noise from the entry to the cave. "What is that?" I asked, my hand going straight to the handle of my axe.

Ciri's nostrils flared as she appeared to take a good whiff in the direction of the cave. "Bear," she muttered. "Must be a cub."

 _Shit. Must be looking for their momma._ I stood up without a word and walked over to the entrance. "Hey! What do you think you're doing?" the strange Nord shouted after me.

I didn't bother to answer and continued down as far as the rubble allowed me to. Most of the cave was buried under tons and tons of stone, but I could navigate between small pockets of space that connected a few openings. I got maybe thirty feet in before I was swallowed by pitch black darkness and only felt stone in front of me.

That's when I heard the noise again. I was close enough to identify it as a whine. I felt my way towards it and then I smelled blood. Not mine, I got out without as much as a scratch, surprisingly, and this, as far as I could remember, was too far away from where the others had been trapped to be theirs either.

Another soft whine alerted me to the bear right in front of my feet. I had no idea what I'm doing, so I knelt down and started feeling for injuries. The cub tried to bite me once, but it was too weak to bite down hard. It already had teeth and fur, so it wasn't completely newborn. At least I remembered this much from biology class.

It mewled miserably at the rocks in front of us; could be where their mother was killed. One of their hind legs was stuck beneath a fallen rock. I heaved the offending piece of stone away and pulled the poor thing into my arms, careful not to put too much pressure on the wound. Package in my arms, I made my way back to the surface.

I put it down by the stones where the others sat and started examining the wound. The cub looked quite miserable, but it didn't protest. "At least the leg isn't crushed, it's just a flesh wound," I declared.

"What in Oblivion are you doing?" Ralof asked, obviously surprised by my actions.

"Well, what does it look like?" I asked without looking up from where I was kneeling.

"But why? This bear will have no qualms trying to kill you later. It's docile now because it's hurt," he continued to argue.

"Well, it has yet to do anything to deserve being killed. I won't blame its, or rather _his_ mother's," I corrected myself after a quick peek between his hind legs, "actions on him. Screw the circle of life."

That said, and thus Ralof successfully silenced, I pulled off my dirty dress shirt and my (relatively clean) undershirt, pulled the dress shirt on again and began ripping the undershirt into long strips that would have to make do as makeshift bandages.

With a few branches I gathered from the vicinity and the cloth bandages, I successfully completed my first time giving first aid to a bear.

"And now?" Ciri asked with a slight smirk.

I took in the sorry sight of the little cub. It looked miserable, but it was alive. "Well, I can't very well leave him here, now can I?"

This will be great, I just know it. Totally safe. Nothing bad can happen, I'm sure. Right?


	4. Road to Riverwood

**Chapter 4: Road to Riverwood  
**

"I think introductions are in order," Hadvar said. "I'm Hadvar. This is Ralof, and this fellow is Thor. We're all from Riverwood."

 _Thor of Riverwood, eh? Interesting..._

"Ciri. Jonathan. Not from Skyrim."

I put the cub down and exhaled with relief when the splint seemed to let him walk. It was relatively slow, and he still seemed to hobble, but it was better than not walking at all.

"Any of you know any restoration spells that could help?" I asked.

Heads were shook all around, and I cursed inwardly. "Sorry; I can barely heal myself, let alone others," Hadvar said.

"Is that what they teach you traitors nowadays?" Ralof asked with a scoff. Hadvar's face darkened immediately.

"Oh, no; we are _so_ not doing this," I growled. "Do I have to bash your heads together, so that you might gain some sense?"

Ralof and Hadvar stared at me with confusion and indignation, Ciri and Thor with a look of slight amusement, as far as I could tell.

"This whole civil war is so ridiculous. Who do you think benefits the most from prolonging the war? A war that keeps Skyrim in no condition to deal with outside threats, and a considerable amount of the Empire's forces occupied and weakened? Put those brains of yours to use, damn it. As long as there is a civil war in Skyrim, the Thalmor will rule over you."

Both looked at me as if they wanted to say something, but I was having none of it. I meant what I said; as so often with politics, it was facepalm-inducing. "No. Both sides of the conflict are at fault, and as long as neither can see that, the only winner is their common enemy. I assume you two grew up together if you're from the same town. Why are political differences interfering with friendships? Or have you Nords become bickering fishwives while I wasn't looking? You'll have time to think about that on the road. Now, are you or are you not ready for the trip to Riverwood?"

Properly scolded, it didn't take long for them to get ready, and we started the trip to the next village. I assumed they saw my point, because neither seemed to take any offense to my words. Or maybe they were actually thinking about what I said. It surprised me a little, I must say, but neither in this world nor in my own was I ever one to look a gift horse in the mouth. I fared well enough with it so far.

Our tag-alongs were a bit slower than us, which just meant that it was more a leisurely walk than the forced jog I had feared.

As expected, our path led us by three standing stones, which Ciri politely refused to touch. "How do they work, anyway?" I asked, inspecting the inscriptions.

"No idea, but we don't need to know how it works to use it, now do we?" Ralof replied with raised eyebrows.

"Fair enough," Thor said with a shrug, and laid his hands on the Warrior Stone. I watched the stone intently, but nothing happened, as far as I could tell.

The Nord stepped away from it and rolled his shoulders, a small grin on his lips. "Haven't felt like that in a long time."

"Did it work?" I asked.

He turned around and smirked at me. "Only one way to find out."

"Fine," I muttered, and imitated his gesture, laying my hand on the Warrior Stone.

At first, nothing happened and I was feeling kinda bummed out. Then my hand started getting warmer and warmer. I almost pulled my hand away in shock, but Thor held it in place with a small smile. The stone lit up, making my hand and shortly after that the rest of the body tingle like crazy.

The beam shot out of the top and skyward before fading after a few seconds. The Nord released my hand as I unsteadily stepped away from the Stone and stared in wonder at the residual afterglow that still clung to my hand. "That. Was. Awesome!" I exclaimed with a big smile on my face, looking back up to the group.

"Warrior, eh? Good choice," Hadvar said and nodded at me.

I shrugged, still smiling widely from the experience. "Well, I'll need it. I've never held an actual sword in my hand before today, and I have a feeling that won't do in Skyrim."

The Nords all nodded sagely and started walking towards Riverwood again, quickly followed by Ciri, my cub and me.

We spent most of the way in comfortable silence, with the exception of a small pack of wolves that attacked. I stayed with the cub, but I needn't have bothered. Half of them ran away after seeing their apparent alpha die in seconds, courtesy of Ciri. Thor took it upon himself to expertly skin the alpha wolf, which didn't take as long as I would have expected. At least it might bring us some coin.

"We're close to Riverwood now," Ralof explained as we climbed the last ascent.

"By the way, do any of you still have family there?" I asked. "We need supplies, and maybe a bed for the night. We shouldn't stay too long, or at least not all of us. If anything, the Jarl of Whiterun should be interested in what happened in Helgen."

Thor was an orphan, apparently, but the other two happily led us to their families. We had a brief discussion before entering the village and decided to get a room in Delphine's inn so we wouldn't bother the families after already asking for supplies.

Ralof offered to go to his sister by himself, to get some more food for the trip to Whiterun and for the cub, which we gladly accepted. It seemed easier to keep the two former friends separate, at least for now.

The rest of us made our way to Alvor, Hadvar's uncle. He took us in, although he seemed slightly wary of my bear cub. The splint probably helped sell his harmlessness. He did send his daughter downstairs though when the cub came in.

We traded the wolf pelt for a slightly misshapen iron armor for me; one of his daughter's better pieces, if her proud smile when I said it fit nicely was anything to go by. I had already written my shirt off, so it didn't hurt my heart as much when I had to wear it as underarmor. It was a fine, pure cotton dress shirt, woven to withstand the hardest office environment, but I had no illusions about its life expectancy under iron armor. It would get me to Whiterun, at least. Or so I hoped.

Alvor gave us backpacks as well, a welcome addition to our inventory. They weren't exactly the trekking backpacks I was used to in my world, but rather smaller and larger pouches worn around the belt.

Indeed, you could call them fanny packs. But the joke would be on you, because those fanny packs are damn useful. Or at least, that's what Thor said approvingly when Alvor plucked those out of a chest by his forge.

We spent most of the day getting supplies, and while we tried to keep a low profile, that didn't exactly work in a village of about a dozen people. By the end of the day, we were the talk of the village.

We were enjoying a light meal of fish when Camilla Valerius followed her brother Lucan into the inn, both siblings seemingly quite agitated.

"See, sister dearest? I _am_ doing something about it. Now will you finally shut up about going there yourself?"

His sister put her hands to her hips. "Don't get ahead of yourself. They haven't even agreed to help us yet."

"Bah. Formalities, that's all."

By the end of that discussion, they had arrived at our table. "Is there something we can do for you?" I asked, keeping my amusement hidden as best as I could.

"Indeed, there is," Lucan said and threw his sister a look of 'I told you so'.

"I am the owner of the 'Riverwood Trader', and we had a break in a few weeks ago. Curiously enough, they stole nothing except for a dragon claw figurine out of pure gold. Well, I know that the claw's thieves are holed up in Bleak Falls Barrow, but I can't get there myself," he explained.

I chuckled. "Because it is borderline suicide, you mean. We may not be from around here, but we're not stupid. The barrow surely is crawling with Draugr, not to mention the bandit infestation on the way up." I saw him wincing as I mentioned the perils. "I, for one, really don't want to go, but if you can make it worth our while, we will at least think about it."

Ciri had been right of course; if we were to stay any considerable amount of time in this place, we needed supplies. And money. We'd need a bunch of septims for anything and everything, and doing the odd job for Skyrim's inhabitants had the positive side effect of not only filling our figurative coffers, but also adding the bonus of favors, connections, reputations and the like. Not that I had any intention to go near that wretched barrow; but a possible Dragonborn and a certified badass like Ciri should be well able to handle themselves.

"Well, I have still some money from a shipment that came through a short while ago," he started with no short amount of uncertainty. "If you can bring me the claw and deal with the thieves, those four hundred septims are yours."

Lucan Valerius looked like it hadn't been easy for him to bring this sentence over his lips, but as it were, it was a damn good offer and we'd be fools not to take it.

"That is very generous of you, thank you. We might take you up on that, but not today. We need to heal, and gather supplies."

Ever the businessman, Lucan put on a smile upon hearing that. "Well, if you need supplies, you're always welcome in the Riverwood Trader. We have quite the collection of items that might interest you."

Ciri chuckled at Lucan's business sense. "Very kind of you. If we need more supplies, we'll come to you. However, it is growing late. We will need to retire to our room now."

The Valerian siblings got the hint and retreated from the main room, leaving us to our own devices. We quickly finished the meal and made our way to the room we had rented, and I realized with a teeny tiny bit of dread that there was only one bed.

"You can take the bed, I can take the floor," I said.

I could feel the heat creeping up my neck and spreading across my whole face, which was made even worse by the fact that she could tell exactly what was going on, thanks to whatever training she had undergone.

She chuckled at my predicament and grinned at me. "If it doesn't make you too uncomfortable, we can share the bed. It is certainly big enough for two, is it not?"

I was _this_ close to reply with, 'That's what she said' _,_ but I caught myself just in time. Not that she would have understood that admittedly corny joke, anyway. Or maybe it's a universal thing, but I was not going to test it out. At least the joke gave me back some of my confidence. And ultimately, she _was_ offering a soft, warm bed instead of the cold, hard stone floor.

"Fine. I'm not above admitting that I enjoy the comforts of a soft bed, even if that means sharing. If you are okay with it, by all means. I promise I won't try any funny business," I added with a slight smile. She only shrugged and agreed to it.

We doffed our armor and climbed into bed; we kept our distance, naturally, but it was curious that I ended up as the little spoon in the morning. It didn't matter though, because it soon came back to me what was our target today.

 _Well, off to fight the undead then._


End file.
